Spread your wings

Mark Key

From Copeland council to Cambridge University

When Mark Key saw Construction Manager in April 2005, he was inspired. The cover feature, headlined ‘A Cambridge degree? Me?’, told the story of Ken Hannah, a construction manager who had studied part time for a masters degree at Cambridge.

‘It looked really interesting, exactly the sort of thing I wanted to do,’ recalls Key, who is principal building control surveyor for Copeland Borough Council.

Key had already caught the study bug, having completed an honours degree in Building Management from Nottingham Trent University, done partially through distance learning with days at a study centre in York University. Until then the ex-bricklayer’s highest qualification was an HNC.

After four years’ studying for the degree his wife was sceptical about the masters, but understanding. ‘Basically, she said that as long as I could guarantee it was not going to be as time-consuming as the honours degree, I should go for it,’ says Key.

The structure of the Interdisciplinary Design in the Built Environment (IDBE) masters attracted Key. The course requires less written work than most masters, with much of the work packed into seven intense residential weeks or ‘design studios’.

Then there was the whole Cambridge thing, admits Key. He enjoyed wandering through the colleges and grounds, attending dinners in their robes and dressing up for the James Bond-themed summer ball.

As the first residential week approached, Key’s excitement turned to trepidation as he wondered if he was up to it and what to expect. Students arrive on Sunday and receive a briefing pack detailing the project and the team they will be working in. Lectures and study follow and the group must work up their project to present to the other students and two visiting assessors the following Saturday.

Of the 23 who started, five fell by the wayside, some of them in that first week. ‘It was very difficult,’ says Key. ‘And some of the people you meet are very different. But once you give it time and acclimatise, it’s just marvellous. The experience gets better each week you go.’

Subjects for the weeks’ study included sustainability, infrastructure, facade design and leadership. Key felt his confidence growing over the course of the two years and believes it contributed to his promotion from building control surveyor to his current role where he heads up a small team.

Key’s outlook has also altered and he enthusiastically espouses early involvement of building control professionals so that they can add to schemes rather than destroy already completed designs.

Key thought he would need a rest after six years of working and studying, but instead he’s restless. ‘I used to relax by doing DIY but now I find that other things stimulate me, like reading and research.’ Next step PhD?

Anja Seegel

A passport to a better job

For project manager Anja Seegel, studying a masters at Nottingham Trent University was her ticket to the UK and project management. She had completed an architecture degree in Germany, but in 1999 construction was slow over there and besides, architects don’t take on the role of project manager in Germany.

Seegel’s choice of MSc was a demanding one. The International Construction Management masters was delivered in four different universities – Nottingham Trent, Waterford in Ireland, Chambéry in France and Karlsruhe in Germany – and in three different languages!

‘I thought that with my basic English I would be fine,’ says Seegel of her first three-month stint in the UK. ‘The biggest challenge was to sit in lectures on a technical subject and not to understand anything. It took six weeks and then it started to come slowly. And my French was worse than my English!’

Seegel admits to nearly giving up, but she persevered and was snapped up at the end of the year’s full-time course to work for Davis Langdon. Her first job was on a Legoland theme park in Germany followed by work in the firm’s London office.

After fours years with Davis Langdon, Seegel moved to work for a small consultancy in Nottingham to be near her partner and last year started work as a senior project manager with Turner & Townsend. She also lectures final year students on the quantity surveying and construction management degrees at Nottingham Trent.

As well as opening doors as Seegel had hoped, the MSc opened her eyes. ‘I approach things more holistically now,’ she explains. ‘I try to see the bigger picture rather than the detail.’

But she also has a word of warning: check the course’s accreditation. The MSc (which Nottingham Trent is reviewing) was not accredited by RICS so she had to carry out a postgraduate diploma in project management from the College of Estate Management to secure membership.

Kevin Hodgson

Two decades climbing through the ranks

It was necessity that brought Kevin Hodgson into construction. He needed a job and heard through a friend of a friend that there was one going as a site operative at Concrete Repairs. 24 years later he’s still there, but now he’s senior contracts manager.

Hodgson’s success story is a familiar one: young man with no qualifications drifts into construction, finds he likes it and works his way up the ranks through hard graft and study. But this can only happen if the firm he is working for has the right culture, as Hodgson reminds us. ‘When I started working with Concrete Repairs I noticed that people within the company were getting promoted. I thought that maybe I could do that as well.’

When Hodgson reached site manager level, he wanted a qualification. ‘I needed some formal qualification to at least say on paper I could do the job.’ And a couple of management courses had persuaded him that studying wasn’t so bad after all: ‘I got a taste for it’.

Colleagues recommended CIOB’s SMET, a two-year diploma course run by Westacott Management Resources and delivered through day release.

Hodgson admits it was tough to find the time, having worked long hours on site, but adds: ‘If you want something, you are motivated to push for it. You make the time.’

The next step was to become chartered. The ideal route was the CIOB’s direct membership examination (DMX) (replaced last year by the experienced practitioner assessment), again studied through Westacott.

It has been a long haul from site operative to contracts manager. Hodgson is considering what his next move will be, but is happy with his progress: ‘When I left school at 16, my prospects were pretty bleak. Through learning and sticking at it, I am now in the position I’m in. I earn a good salary, live in a nice house and have great colleagues.’

Christina Vodaforde

Determined to succeed

Just listening to self-confessed workaholic Christina Vodaforde’s schedule will make you tired. By day, she’s a record controller for the construction department of Board Gais Ireland, by night a property developer and serial part-time studier.

Having gained a diploma in industrial chemistry, a BA in languages, and a certificate in business management in her native Romania, Vodaforde moved to Ireland in 1997 and started a business renovating and letting out property in 1998. Her first taste of construction-related study was a CAD course to allow her to create drawings for planning and from there she realised she needed to know more about building and started a diploma at Cork Institute of Technology while squeezing in a one-year City & Guilds AutoCAD course.

In 2004 she started a distance learning course at the College of Estate Management in Reading, cramming the four-year BSc into two years. ‘It was difficult, it takes its toll,’ she admits. Nevertheless, in 2006 she emerged with a first class honours degree.

But it wasn’t enough. Last year Vodaforde started an MBA in Construction and Real Estate. Vodaforde wants to become a project engineer with Board Gais Ireland, where she has worked for eight years. Despite her qualifications and housing business, there is still a perception that she lacks experience. ‘It’s very difficult to make your voice heard,’ she said. ‘I had to get more knowledge.’

So Vodaforde is pursuing her goals, which means studying, working with Board Gais Ireland and donning her working clothes evenings and weekends to plaster and paint with her husband in the family business. Phew!